ESPN 30 for 30 had Nature Boy which made me choke up. I'm sure HBO will make me tear up about Andre the Giant.

I imagine that if there is anyone out there who's only knowledge of Andre comes from stories told by Hulk Hogan, they are going to be entirely disappointed to not see a two-thousand pound giant. For everyone else, this should be pretty awesome. Seems to have stuff even hardcore wrestling fans may not know.

Bump for a live watch tonight.

I just finished this. It was great. Highly recommended.

I rarely watch any kind of tv besides actual wrestling but had to see this Andre doc. I still haven't even seen that Nature Boy 30 for 30 mentioned in the OP. Some day.

confirmed for me.

Yeah, really enjoyed this.

(Pretty sure Hogan's full of **** as usual in his attempt to recount the end of their WM III match as just him reacting to Andre calling the final spots on the fly, and expecting Andre to kick out of the legdrop.)

Really great, though I confess to briefly dozing off in the last 5-10 min when the focus was on Andre’s declining health.

So a thought experiment: If peak Andre (health/strength) was trained in basic MMA, could anyone on Earth beat him in a shoot fight? It’s just hard to imagine someone KOing him or actually getting their arms around him for some kind of submission.

Leg attacks/leg submissions could work. But Andre in his prime was unbelievably athletic for such a monster. Would be a tough task.

Could peak Lesnar score a takedown? Given that Andre threw guys Lesnar’s size around like rag dolls I’m just not sure.

If you watch it in slow motion, when Andre is hitting the mat you can make out him yelling something and it most certainly looks like the word leg.

Andre vs. Lesnar obviously is the peak matchup. Both of them physical freaks of nature. Lesnar's wrestling background makes me think he could get in close enough, quickly enough, to make a single or double leg work (the key is closing the distance before Andre can put his arm and upper body strength to work).

I think Lesnar is 60 percent to score a takedown, but doubt he could then keep Andre down. However I also like Lesnar at 60-40 odds to win a freestyle wrestling match utilizing the "take him down for two points, let him up to give one back, rinse and repeat" method. The danger would be if Andre chooses the "up" position to start a period, then gets Lesnar pinned.

No one is beating Andre in Greco Roman, though.

MMA matchup is nearly impossible to predict because I/we know absolutely nothing about Andre's striking capability. I think I like Lesnar to win an MMA match by extending it and wearing Andre down.

Great thought exercise. Wish we could see it.

Great analysis.

Just random thoughts:

-I wonder how hard Peak Andre hits if he’s trained in striking.

-I think Andre brutalizes anyone on planet Earth in the clinch.

-Takedowns are interesting, as I wonder how low Andre’a center of gravity would be.

-I think you’re right, the way to beat Andre would be to make him gas. Get him to blow up like Ultimate Warrior after sprinting to the ring, and pepper him with quick shots.

How this only has 10 posts is insane.

Something premiering at 10 p.m. on a weeknight on a channel that I'm sure a significant number (of a board that doesn't have a massive number of posters to begin with) don't have...it's not too surprising that the topic isn't an instant blow-up. Hopefully most see this over time, as it's well worth everyone's while.

Roman Reigns could beat Andre ez pz np.

I made the above post right after I watched the Doc.



To me, clearly Vince is trying to find/create the next Andre, and that explains his use of Roman to me.

Only watched the first 15-20 minutes so far, but was shocked at how skinny Andre was when he started. Not that he wasn't huge at 19 (the hands were already ginormous), but 6-10 and 300 is not the same as 7-1 (or whatever) and close to 500.

7,000 calories a day takes a while to catch up to you

Isn't that just the estimated caloric intake from alcohol? It would be interesting to see what he ate in a day.

Finally finished this. Very well done, even though I knew about 75 percent of the content already.

The thing that blew my mind was that Andre's back was so bad in 1986, he couldn't even catch the 100-pound "Buttercup" in the movie scene.

It really highlighted how hellish life on the road must have been for Andre. So many small things we take for granted, like having a decent bed, bathroom on a plane, silverware, all created complications for him.

Yeah, it wasn't difficult to believe that Andre would wish that he could be Tim White for one day a week.

I had never seen an early early Andre match till this



The funniest thing about this, besides the body slam to pin, was the size of that belt.
Andre could have literally turned it into a bracelet,especially as he got bigger

Interesting that Andre seemed to catch on about how Vince was exploiting him, especially late in his career. Wonder if Vince really believes his own **** about giving Andre "purpose".